A millennium village set up by deputy prime minister John Prescott is four years behind schedule.
Not a single brick of the 520 homes planned for Allerton Bywater, near Leeds, has yet been laid. Work will not begin before next spring, site owner English Partnerships said this week.

The admission came only weeks after Prescott announced three new millennium villages to join the four already under way.

Allerton Bywater was conceived in 1998 as Prescott's riposte to the millennium village in Greenwich, south-east London.

An equally good development could be achieved in the North, Prescott said at the time.

Later, he added East Manchester and King's Lynn to the programme and last month East Ketley, Milton Keynes and Hastings were announced.

The former colliery site is on both the floodplain of a river and in the blast zone of a chemical plant

Allerton Bywater has been beset with problems from the outset. The former colliery site was found to be within the blast zone of a nearby chemical plant.

It is also on the floodplain of a river, and contains two gas ventilation shafts from mine workings below.

Protests from residents of the existing village forced English Partnerships to reduce the numbers and mix of homes. Now the agency says the developers, Gleeson and Miller Homes, have asked for more time as they are unhappy with the house types required.